The Soul Calendar: Japan

Showing posts with label Japan. Show all posts

17 April 2011

Dennys: News Politics Comedy Science Arts & Food: Posts Roundup at Dennys Blogs - 17 April 2011

Dennys: News Politics Comedy Science Arts & Food: Posts Roundup at Dennys Blogs - 17 April 2011: "While the Japanese nuclear crisis continues unabated, the rest of the world has moved on, dreading the inevitable. At the moment the world community has pressured Japan to come up with a plan to contain or deal with the crisis over a nine month period.

Why the same people are in charge of this mess that created the mess is a mystery. It's as foolish as it was to trust BP to clean up the oil spill disaster in my own Gulf of Mexico. Serious hardships still exist as a result of President Obama and BP refusing to do what it takes to make things right, especially in Louisiana.

At the very least the President could do is refuse to allow BP access to any of America's oil fields on or off shore. The company has simply not earned the right to drill for oil on American soil or in our oceans."

27 March 2011

The Social Poets: Japan: We Are Far Beyond Level 5 Nuclear Threat

Photo of Three Mile Island nuclear power plant...

Three Mile Island - Image via Wikipedia

The Social Poets: Japan: We Are Far Beyond Level 5 Nuclear Threat: "Today it was finally acknowledged the radiation is now 10,000,000 times safety levels.

New reports stream in about how TEPCO did not do safety inspections over many years. Today another blow to their credibility:"

The Social Poets: Japan: Probable Breach, Time to Kill The Reactors, Cartoons

Plutonium Finishing Plant personnel have finished stabilizing one of the riskiest forms of plutonium-bearing materials at Hanford. Polycubes are small cubes of polystyrene impregnated with pure plutonium oxide. Hundreds of polycube items remained at PFP after being fabricated for use in criticality experiments at Hanford during the 1960s and early 1970s. Pacific Northwest National Laboratory assisted in the cleanup of these difficult materials. - Image by PNNL - Pacific Northwest National Laboratory via Flickr

The Social Poets: Japan: Probable Breach, Time to Kill The Reactors, Cartoons: "As engineers scramble to discover the details of what is happening inside the most dangerous reactor, number three, the one containing plutonium, the politicians scramble their message and the truth of information.

This week the Japanese decided to change the standard of what the plant workers are exposed to when they discovered it was 250 times the acknowledged international standard. Leave it to the dogma crowd to downplay the severity of this situation by declaring 'new standards' of radiation levels so that the plant workers are only exposed to 2.5 times their new standard."

18 March 2011

The Social Poets: Japan: Plutonium Reactor Careening Out of Control, 18 Political Cartoons

Image via Wikipedia

The Social Poets: Japan: Plutonium Reactor Careening Out of Control, 18 Political Cartoons: "The whole world watches, waits, and holds its breath dreading nightmarish nuclear disaster. We are transfixed upon every tiny bit of streaming news coverage to the point of emotional saturation. And the news does not get any better. Even the Japanese government called the situation today 'very grave.'"

12 August 2009

3 Videos: Violent Typhoons Affect 9 Million People in Asia

From Denny: These typhoon stories in Asia began on August 9th and the ramifications are still playing out. Over 1 million people in China had to flee the first day. Hundreds are dead from China, Taiwan, Japan to the Philippines from these two violent typhoons. Over 9 million people have been displaced or affected by these violent storms to date.

As an American teenager living in Taiwan many years ago, I went to an American school on the island. I spent two summers on the southern part of the island country helping medical missionaries for free as my boarding school roommate was the child of medical missionaries.

The second summer was cut short as a typhoon was coming your way off the water and it sure was scary. If you have never seen a typhoon coming at you, well, hurricanes are tame. It looks just like a funnel tornado only it's still connected to the sky and the water, builds up tremendous speed and starts rushing toward the shore: you! It hits with the tremendous force of both wind and water, a double whammy. No wonder you see huge homes on concrete foundations just drop off into the water and sail away in this news footage.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

typhoon, Asia, Taiwan, Philippines, China, Weather Phenomena

30 April 2009

Weather: Cool Satellite Photo of Washington, D.C. Flowering in the Spring!

From Denny: Popular Science online magazine featured this photo recently. It's from the GeoEye-1 satellite, orbiting at four miles per second, passing over Washington, D.C. during the Cherry Blossom season this April 4th to "admire the view." ;)

The view was shot from the height of 423 miles as the spacecraft moved from north to south along America's eastern seaboard. Along the tidal basin the cherry trees are in full bloom. The huge number of cherry trees were all a gift from Japan to America decades ago.

Washington, D.C. in bloom Image via Wikipedia

Someone left this comment on their site:

"Can anyone tell me the time of day that the image was taken?

The Washington Monument makes a fantastic sundial, it's almost a shame the builders didn't insinuate analematic features into the monument-scape of the Mall."

Now there's an interesting idea!

For a larger view of this satellite photo, go here.

17 April 2009

Technology: Robolegs Help People Walk

From WiredScience.com comes this really cool article:

"Honda's walking assist devices, which make people move a bit like the ASIMO robot, made their American debut Tuesday in New York City.

The devices combine sensor-driven motors and weight-bearing chassis to guide strides and support body weight. Though derived from technologies pioneered during the ASIMO's quarter-century of development, their use could be deeply human, boosting manual laborers or assisting people unable to walk without help.

"Japan is a country with an aging society. We want to do something for them," said Ken Yasuhara, assistant chief engineer of Honda's Research Division 2.

The systems were announced by Honda last year, and enter an increasingly crowded field of prototype assisted locomotion devices.

But unlike Cyberdyne's HAL and Amit Goffer's ReWalk, Honda's systems are light and mobile enough to envision in everyday life. Unlike the Sister Kenny Foundation's Lokomat, they're not tethered to a treadmill.

The devices are still in the research stage, and Honda has not yet formalized plans to go commercial. If they do, the market could be large, and not only in Japan. The number of Americans aged 65 and older is expected to double by 2030. More than 17 million report difficulty climbing stairs or walking a quarter-mile."

Here are two demo videos below. For more of the article, click on the title link.